Paul Schiernecker

Author: Paul

  • #3 – Run a marathon.

    There are some things that made it onto my list of thirty things to do before I was thirty that were pure filler. Up there I would include Play Cluedo and Make a Baked Alaska, both of which I managed to do in a single, very successful, evening. There are others that have genuinely been something I thought I wanted to do. You know how sometimes, when you’re drunk, you’ll start randomly getting off with someone, and then you’ll have a moment of clarity where you wonder what the hell you are doing and who this person even is and whether their parents are rich and elderly. Imagine that for twenty-six miles. Congratulations, you’ve just imagined running a marathon.

    I have entered the ballot for the London Marathon every year for at least the last five years. I always said that if I got a place then I would commit to it with my everything, that I would dig deep. That I would quit drinking and drunkenly casual smoking and that I would eat nothing but spinach and pasta and kale milkshakes. In October 2016 I found out that I had a place in the London Marathon 2017. With six months before the event I did what any sane person would do, I buried the congratulations letter under the pile of stuff I inexplicably keep on top of my microwave and developed a hernia the size of a hamster.

    I put the deal-breaker that I had to get in on the ballot for a reason. Any old shmuck can get in on a charity place, you just have to be willing to raise £3k+ for said charity. That’s an awful lot of pressure. Imagine having to run twenty-six miles while wondering whether your overdraft is going to stretch to cover little Timmy’s dialysis machine because you didn’t bother to host a charity curry night. That’s too much pressure. I’ll stick to regular old pressure, like a car tyre or an aneurysm.

    Once I was over the hernia (which was in no way linked to my wanton love of casual sex) I started to actually train. I ran. I ran a lot. I ran at weekends with hangovers the size of Swansea. I ran in the mornings when the South Bank was a fucking Home Alone death trap of ice and bitter child stars. I ran for trains and for buses and from my responsibilities. I even joined a gym and considered getting a FitBit.

    I was spending all week at work and every weekend at Hide & Shriek writing Delectably Dead. We would stay up late working and goofing around on ChatRoulette and then I would get up the next morning and run fifteen miles before working on our next project. It was pretty full on but I was still drinking and still casually drunkenly smoking. I grew tired of running in the gym because it felt like I was getting absolutely nowhere (ha!). I now haven’t stepped foot in that gym in three months. The Direct Debit continues to come out. I am shamed.

    I had a countdown on my calendar at work. I injured my ankle and I bought a new pair of running shoes. I started to notice that my thighs were physically pained when pushed into a pair of skinny jeans. I was getting stronger. My self-control however was getting weaker. Three days before the marathon I discovered the two pint glasses at a Kasabian gig and was hungover for the next two days. Then, I discovered it was marathon race day and I had to get my ass to Blackheath.

    It is a weird and wonderful thing to take part in the marathon. The first thing I feel I should comment on is how serious people take it. I was taking it very seriously. I ate pasta for breakfast, that’s how serious I was about this marathon. The other thing that people take very seriously is a strategic poo. The queues for the loos were horrific and everyone smelt like Deep Heat and Lucozade tablets. There was someone attempting to brighten the mood by talking loudly over a tannoy and playing Let Me Entertain You. I wanted him dead. I had tried to read up on marathon etiquette. The key things seemed to be:
    Cover your entire body in Vaseline. You will die otherwise
    Don’t you dare eat fruit or vegetables. You will die otherwise.
    Blackheath is very cold at eight in the morning. Bring clothes.
    Be prepared to throw those clothes away because when you run you get hot
    Actually, forget the coat, wear a bin bag. You can rip out of it like a trashy lithe Hulk when you start jogging.
    Don’t listen to music when you’re running. You will die otherwise.
    Run with music because listening to people is awful.
    Don’t talk to anyone.
    Don’t take sweets from strangers.
    Don’t drink water. It contains invisible eels that are poisonous.
    Pain is just your toenails leaving your body.

    I only made some of these up.

    I was really nervous about running the marathon. I knew I hadn’t done anywhere near the distance in training. The most I had clocked up in a single sesh was fifteen miles. I know that’s a lot but it still left eleven glorious miles of undiscovered torture ahead of me. I was once told that running longer than ten miles is just causing damage to your body. That’s sixteen lovely miles of damage per marathon.


    I started and there was this incredible roar from the crowd. I ripped through the binbag like a T-Rex on acid and realised  I had nothing to be nervous about. It was just running. I knew how to do running. I had been running for years. Running is easy. It’s paying bills and toeing the line that’s difficult. I put my music on. I had put together a brilliant playlist called I Just Started Running. It was Biffy Clyro and Black Keys exclusively. I was sure that I could listen to Biffy Clyro and Black Keys exclusively for four hours. They had been my go to bands when training. I could do this. I could bloody run the marathon.

    After a couple of miles I realised how incredibly dull that bit of London is. The crowds were small and a bit boring looking. I did like high-fiving the kids who reached over the barriers with their tiny outstretched hands. I stopped for a bottle of water. I had been denying myself a proper drink because I didn’t want to get too much liquid in me. This would make me heavy and need to wee all the time. Also, don’t people die from drinking too much water? Is that a thing? I feel like it’s something people on Ecstasy do. Now that sounds like a VICE article – I Ran The Marathon On Pills.
    I finished a bottle of water and picked up another at the next station. Then I really needed a wee.

    There are toilets every two miles. That’s a lot of toilets I guess. It isn’t when you’re bursting and running and have to keep up your pace and trying to calculate how fast you need to run before the next marker to make up the weeing time. It’s a long way when you’re trying to calculate how long a wee really takes including untucking and retucking. I got to the toilets and they were all in use. I relieved myself against a fence. A million other men ran up and did the same.


    At six miles we got to the Cutty Sark. Here there were huge crowds and I looked at every little face trying to recognise someone I knew but they were all smiling strangers. I had made the bold decision not to put my name on my shirt. I’m sure it’s fun at first but considering the state I was in by the end it would have really fucked me off for some condescending twat swigging a pint of London Pride to be going “come on Paul”. He can hypothetically fuck right off. The crowds thinned and then I did another wee, this time against a wall. I soon discovered that my Strava app, which I was using to map the distance I covered, was about two hundred metres short of the actual distance per mile. By eight miles it was making me want to cut my ears off.

    I have never had an issue with my nipples when running. I know it’s a common complaint for runners and it was a subject of considerable mirth for my little brother to tell me to mind my nipples but it’s just never bothered me. At thirteen miles, the Vaseline I had smeared all over my body was sweating loose and my nipples were full of the joyous pain of rubbing. I cursed my brother, sure it was all his fault, and carried on.

    Then, a miracle in the form of St John’s Ambulance. They were stood at the side of the path with their hands outstretched in latex gloves. Their hands were piled with Vaseline. We could help ourselves. I whipped up a glob and rubbed my sweet little nips down with a ferocity that really gave the crowd something to think about. I did not give a fuck.

    At thirteen miles I ran across Tower Bridge and I was so full of joy and pith that I got my phone out and took a sweaty picture of myself. I was sure I could do this. I felt fantastic. There were so many people and so much noise and I was full of life and joy and bottles of Buxton water.
    Around the bend I picked up some energy gels and realised that I don’t like energy gels. One revelation followed the other.


    There was a “shower” just along Shadwell, where you could run through a series of spray machines that had been set up. The cold water took my breath away and I wasn’t sure if the moisture bouncing down my body was sweat or shower spray as I continued on my way towards greatness (and a stitch).

    It was at around this point that people started to offer out sweets. Some of them had convenience store-sized tubs which they would dangle temptingly over the barriers for us to pick at as we ran past. I discovered that hoovering up pick ‘n’ mix at around six miles an hour is harder than it sounds. Other people had dishes and plates of sweets. Some people had wrapped up little packages of jelly beans and jelly babies in foil or paper so you could pick at them as you ran around. It was very much like what I imagine picking up heroin to be like. It was only as I finished my third scoop of confectionery that I remembered that I was vegetarian and that a lot of it probably contained beef gelatin. I’m sorry Paul McCartney. I’m sorry Morrissey!

    Running in itself started to get tougher. I realised I was in a realm beyond the unknown. At mile sixteen I figured I was going to be able to do another ten miles with only a little bit of pain. I was starting to ache and the ankle I had injured while training was in good company as everything else in and around my body pulsed with the effort of what I was doing. I was on my third Biffy Clyro album. The sweet sound of Simon Neil’s voice was making me want to vomit. Everything was making me want to vomit. It didn’t matter how many bottles of water I had, how many Lucozade gels I sucked on or how many fresh dabs of Vaseline I was able to load up onto my tits, I was struggling.

    I realised something had gone terribly wrong when I turned a corner onto Canary Wharf and started to cry. The only reason anyone has good cause to cry at the sight of Canary Wharf is if they work there. I knew I was being irrational but I couldn’t help it. I felt like I needed someone to slap me in the face, hard. I needed a good old Dynasty open hand to the chops. My running was still automatic but it must have looked like I was a clockwork dinosaur on the last couple of ticks.

    I stopped running at twenty-one miles. I knew I was going to finish. I knew I had to finish but it didn’t mean that I was going to run the whole thing. I was in serious trouble. Everything hurt. I couldn’t get up the energy to start running again. I was pretty sure that the end was coming. I took a moment to remember that I had failed to write my emergency contact details on the reverse of my race number. If I went down then they weren’t going to find anything on me that would help identify who I was and what I needed (answers: Paul Schiernecker, not to run anymore). I was only able to start running again when I heard my actual name being called from the crowd. I looked up and my friends Adam and Tom were there. They grabbed at me and ushered me along and I started up again and realised it had been a mistake to stop. Along the side of the road were pale looking bodies in shorts and foil. They had blown up. They weren’t going to make it. I was. It was just a matter of grit.

    Further down the same stretch I saw Clarissa. We quickly hugged and it was only afterwards that she was able to tell me how awful I looked. I had lost any kind of dignity. I just needed to make it to the end. The crowds were growing and there were people everywhere. I couldn’t show any sign of weakness. They preyed on that.

    The final three miles were the best of the marathon. Not because I found some kind of inner strength but because I knew it was nearly over. I was running from Tower Hill to Westminster and I knew the area well enough to find it cool that the roads were shut off from the usual traffic and that there were so many people lining the banks. Music boomed at me through the tunnel and I tried not to look at the Walkabout by Temple. Someone had a full twelve-inch pizza balanced on the railings as I ran past them. I hated them, the selfish little cunt. I hated every single person in London. I hated myself and I hated the Queen and I wanted to give up my body and be reincarnated as a discarded Lucozade gel. Why would anybody ever do this to themselves? Why is this even a thing? What kind of monster decided that it had to be 26.2 miles and not just a nice round 26. Some sick and twisted son of a bitch that’s for sure.

    By the time I hit 26 miles, and Strava was telling me that I was at twenty-five I was ready to kill and I was ready to die. I had been broken down and rebuilt so many times that I wasn’t entirely sure of who I was. It was a great feeling. I just had to keep putting one foot in front of the other. I ran past Liz’s gaff and then realised that I was at the finish line and that I had just run a marathon.


    I hobbled along the return stretch beside St James’s Park and tried to work out where I could collapse and die. I collected a medal and for some reason they took note of what shoes I was wearing. I posed for a photo where I looked like a skeleton wearing a Paul mask and then I got my bag and struggled through the park and fell down beside a tree. I had another cry. Running  a marathon is tough and emotional, like an Adele album.


    I stayed down as though getting up again would involve more punishment, like getting knocked on your fanny in a boxing match. I waited for someone to come and get me. I winced and sobbed when I stretched out. I started to get cold. I texted my mummy. Clarissa came to meet me and we slowly made our way to get food. I decided that I was vegetarian again.


    Along the way people congratulated me and kids wanted to high five me and it was the nicest version of London I have ever been a part of. I felt excited and tired and giddy and sick and sleepy and hungry and ready to drop all at the same time. I was all of the fucking seven dwarves. Nothing compares to it. Nothing can beat it. I still didn’t know why I had done it. I didn’t know why anyone would ever do it.

    The train home was so full that I took to the First Class carriage just so I could stretch out. As it was a Sunday the train stopped at every possible station and it was over an hour before I was hobbling back through town and up the two flights of stairs to my flat. When I bought the flat I never considered the fact I would one day take part in a marathon and then have to get home. I struggled inside and didn’t leave for two days.

    There are many things I could say about running a marathon. I could tell you never to do it. I could tell you that I decided straight after that I had now done a marathon and didn’t need to ever take part in one again. Or I could tell you that it really irked me that it took me four hours and sixteen minutes to complete it. It irked me so much in fact that when the applications for the ballot for the London Marathon 2018 opened I entered again. Pain fades. Glory doesn’t.


    Note: Despite how tough this whole experience was for me, I will always remember 2017 as the year I struggle my way through the marathon of Thirteen Reasons Why. What a terrible pile of dross. It took me three times as long to finish that as it did the London Marathon and I didn’t even get a medal at the end of it. Clay is a whining little piss baby, and I say that as someone who just spent three thousand words complaining about running.

  • A picture speaks 860 words. 

    It takes me back. It takes me back seven months and reminds me of what we went through. The first thing anyone else seems to notice is my smile. I hate my smile.
    I see the bus.
    That was the bus that was supposed to collect us at the end of the trek and take us out of the desert after trekking 100km together. That was the bus that broke down.
    When we got to it, we thought we were done. We thought we had finished. We still had a couple of kilometres to go but we waited for the laggers to catch up and everyone went through together. We cheered as we crossed that invisible finish line. Then we somehow had beers and we sat on the dunes and took photos and messed around. There were two buses. There had to be for the one hundred of us. I remember the smug face of the guy in the doorway of the first bus who wouldn’t let me on because he said it was full. I was forced to wait with my friend Adam and the rest of his stupid team.

    We realised the bus was still stuck two kilometres back and it made sense for us to go to it. Once the sun had set there wasn’t an awful lot left for us to do. Once the beers were finished, there was nothing left for us to do. The temperature started to drop. It got below freezing at night, well below.
    We got onto the bus and tried to stay warm. We were taken off so they could try and tow it out. It didn’t work. We sat on the sand and lost more of our body heat. We were ordered back onto the bus. We tried singing and playing games. Nobody had any food. Nobody had any water. We waited for four hours before the original bus returned for us. We were lucky. We laughed it off anyway.

    Then I notice my top. My merino wool base layer. Essential, we were told, to insulate us and to self-clean. I wore it for five days straight. It became a second skin. The smell would probably make your eyes water. I only had one because the combo of top and trousers was £100.00 and I figured I wouldn’t be going back to Mongolia anytime soon. I was right.

    Next it’s my Action Challenger neckerchief. A Schiernecker-chief if you will. I was given that scarf when I trekked my way up the Inca trail to Machu Picchu exactly two years before. I was so sick on that trip but I learnt a lot about my inner strength, what I was capable of. I refused to give up. I refused to drop it. I’m far too stubborn and it’s not often enough that it’s a good thing.

    Then I see my Ray Bans. Actual Ray Bans. I had a pair before that I picked up in Argentina. Those were Roy Bons. I bought the actual Ray Bans in the great spending spree of April 2016, shortly before Adam and I went to Thailand and found exactly the same thing for 200 baht (£4.00). I don’t really go in for the whole brand thing but Ray Bans are cool. They’re cool like Jack Daniels is cool.

    It’s only after that I am able to see my face. The beard that had grown out through our days in the desert. The weird way my hair sat when it was full of smoke, sand, grit and grease. The strange dent between my eyes, either through concentration or Resting Bitch Face. The crow’s feet that appear now when I smile. The hook of heritage in the shape of my nose. The tiny shadow of a puncture mark in the lobe of my left ear from when I let my brother go at it with a sterilised safety pin and a champagne cork. The dimples and for a rare change, what looks like a jawline. The teeth. The smile. The memories.

    Seven months after we flew out to Mongolia, I look at this picture and I forget about all the stuff that bothered me. The things I left behind that I worried about. The trials and tribulations that we all faced along the way. What it reminds me of is that I am the sum of my experiences. I have no recollection of this photo being taken but it looks far too staged to be candid. I would love to go back there, to that moment, to be with the friends I knew and the friends I had made. To taste some more questionable meat in noodles and brine. To listen to the sound of the wind whipping up the tarp as I tried to get to sleep each night, clenching the opening of my sleeping bag together to keep whatever heat I could inside. To drink more straight vodka in a week than I probably had in the rest of my life. To walk every day with a pack on my back. To not want for anything else. To just go. This picture speaks exactly 860 words.


    Photo by Alun Thomas.

  • #7 – Fire a gun.

    ‘What’s Gunny doing here Jeremy?”

    My ears are still ringing. On Friday, the show I co-wrote, Delectably Dead, had its first trip outside of its home county. We headed to Guildford where we performed for eighty people at G Live. Despite how many times I shouted at it, my Sat Nav kept pronouncing it “live”, as in, to still be amongst the living or Liv Tyler.

    The key difference with this show was that I was actually going to be “treading the boards”. In previous incarnations I had only ever been part of the ensemble as a zombie. Last night I got to play Nathan Dimble, a character I only realised during the show spends around two and a half hours onstage. Where’s the gun? Where’s the smoking gun?
    It’s here, here in the story. It’s no secret that DD has loud noises. One of those loud noises is gunfire, from blank firing weapons, including the two I got to pop off to save the audience from the hoards of the undead that tried to get at my beautiful man-flesh. I have always wanted to fire a gun. There’s something carnal yet Hollywood about it. I think of Danny Butterman’s “ever fired your gun in the air and yelled, ‘Aaaaaaah?’”.

    Guns tend to get a bad reputation. It’s probably because of their ability to end lives and all that. I don’t give a damn about my bad reputation. Last night was awesome.
    They key thing with guns is safety. We have to keep them under lock and key, they’re assigned a marshal to safeguard them and are also covered in our public liability insurance. After being trained in handling and operating the weapons I got dressed up in my costume and was ready for the show.

    I don’t want to say too much about the show itself because a lot of the magic is in the mystery. In fact I feel bad that you know there are guns in it. How else are we supposed to protect ourselves against the infected?
    I had an amazing time with a brilliant team of cast and crew and the audience seemed to enjoy themselves.

    I would also like to take this opportunity to express how fucking hard acting is. It is one of the most consuming and exhausting processes and I was playing a character somewhere between myself and Karen from Mean Girls so god knows how Helen Mirren or Danny Dyer feel after a day on set. I have so much respect for anyone who has the discipline and ambition for that, who strives for it. Especially if they’re one of our cast members. Thank you guys.

  • I’m not brave.

    Firemen are brave.
    Malala Yousafzai is brave.
    Lightning McQueen is brave.
    I probably shouldn’t compare them. Only one of them managed to purposely lose the Piston Cup championship and still put Radiator Springs back on the map.

    Last week I published a blog post about my mental health. It was pretty personal. It dealt with some dark shit. It featured a picture which included my nipples.  That’s not brave to me.

    The thing about mental health, and no, I don’t want to be someone who is solely known for speaking out about their psychological well-being, is that it is the same as physical health. It’s intrinsically linked. It’s all in the same body. In my case, it’s all me.

    When someone has an accident, and breaks their leg, they aren’t brave. It’s just something that happens. They talk about it and people sign their cast and in time they get better and it’s something of an anecdote. They might feel twinges of pain in the same area. They may even break it again as there’s a pronounced weakness there, but there’s nothing brave in them telling others that they have broken their leg.

    It’s okay to ask me about my injuries. I’m open to conversations about it. Others might not be so it’s always best to tread lightly and gauge the reaction.

    That aside, I am so grateful to everyone who took the time to read my post last week. The comments and messages I got as a result were incredibly overwhelming. The more I can do to encourage others to talk about mental health then the better I am doing as a writer on the subject. The private messages I received from friends who I didn’t know were going through hard times were incredibly touching and I remain completely available to anyone who wants to talk anything through.

    You are not alone in this and I am not going anywhere.

    Thank you again for your displays of affection,. My little blog didn’t know what had hit it.

  • Sad face and silk sheets. 


    This photo is a year old today. I only know that because a part of me knew I would get better and therefore kept note of the date. I don’t know if you can tell but this is me at a real low. The lowest I had felt in a very long time. I got so ill that I had to go and stay at my dad’s, in the spare room. I was 29 years old and I felt like I had ruined absolutely everything. The days were dark. I couldn’t see a way out. I wanted to die.

    Most people won’t know about this. They know I suffer from depression and anxiety because I try to make it known but it is often hard for people to understand just how consuming, overwhelming and encompassing it can be. I am very much a victim of wearing the painted on smile. That’s why I talk about it. Talking makes it better. A problem shared is a problem solved and all that jazz.

    It was only thanks to the incredible people in my life that I was able to get through those dark days. I had panic attacks at work. I spent my weekends and evenings in bed. I struggled to do anything but I knew I had to. I was a functioning depressive. I got through the days but I was not living, not by a long shot.
    I didn’t feel comfortable in my own home. Nobody else felt comfortable with me being in my own home.

    I was fortunate that my dad had a spare room. He knew that at some point, in his own words, “one of his boys would need it”. He still refers to it as Paul’s Room. When I had an operation in November, I ended up there again.

    I packed the things I would need and I stayed at my dad’s while everyone did their absolute best to pull me through, when a lot of the time, I was loathed to try and do it myself. I owe those people my life.

    So, what’s the point?
    Why am I telling you this?
    It’s because it is important.
    Suicide is the number one killer of men between 25 – 40.
    For far too long, we have been made to bottle up our feelings, to stiff-upper-lip our way through difficult situations and it’s toxic and it has to stop. That’s why I am sharing.
    So what can you do?
    You can do what the people around me did.
    They asked what they could do.

    A friend at work took me aside and told me that she didn’t personally understand what I was going through but that if I felt comfortable explaining it to her, then she was happy to listen, and maybe, it would help. That olive branch got me through another day.

    A lot of the time, I didn’t have the answer. People were there for me when I needed them and even when I pushed them away, I knew it was at my request and that they would be ready and waiting when I was able to talk. It’s a hard thing to get your head around, for all concerned.
    Just listen to people.

    There are some things that help when you feel that low, even when you think they aren’t going to:
    · Get outside
    · Eat
    · Drink plenty of water
    · Watch old films
    · Stare out to sea
    · Tell people you love them
    · Create something
    · Destroy something
    · Pet a dog
    · Read “Reasons To Stay Alive” by Matt Haig

    While on the subject, Reasons To Stay Alive became an incredible source of strength for me. So much so that when I felt better and one of my friends was feeling low, we met for lunch and I gave him my copy. For over an hour we talked about the misunderstandings that come from friends and family when your mental health is bad and what we could do to combat it. We have a project in the pipeline as a result.

    There are so many people around you who are in a very similar head space, even if your twisted melon wants to make you feel like you are completely on your own.
    Fuck it, talk to me if you can’t find anyone else. I’m all ears.

    So, here we are. A year on from the sad face and the silk sheets. What’s happened since?
    Well, I took a trip to Asia to forget about everything.
    I shaved my head.
    I came back and realised I was still me and I was going to have to deal with that.
    I lost weight from depression.
    I threw away or gave away a lot of possessions.
    I got a few more tattoos.
    I lost my dignity in a strip club in Krakow.
    My anti-depressants flattened any sensation so I switched to others which made my hair fall out.
    I gained weight from anti-depressants.
    I tried being vegan.
    I took up meditation.
    I tried being gay.
    I joined a gym.
    I became an uncle.
    I bought a freezer.
    I remembered what it was to love myself.
    I got my creativity back.
    I’ve managed to get a lot of the flying monkeys off my back and day-to-day, I feel pretty good.

    That’s why I am able to look at that picture, and know that I am well and truly on the other side of the lens.

  • #27 – Play Cluedo.

     Was it Mr Pink? In the observatory? With a draft excluder?
    We’ve all played Cluedo before, or have we? That’s a lot of questions to open with, isn’t it?
    Until very recently, I had not played Cluedo. That was why it was on my list of 30 things to do before I turned 30.
    How did I get some Cluedo all up in here? Well, for that we have to head back to a long time ago, about a year ago, when my mum bought me a Cluedo set which sat, wrapped in plastic, in my wardrobe until this week.
    I had friends over. We ate pizza. I made mulled wine. It was a total hoot. As it turned out, we had the maximum number of players possible for Cluedo. Six. That’s how cute and popular I am. Six friends!
    I feel like I have always been aware of Cluedo. It’s like The Godfather. I knew all of the Godfather before I ever watched it. I found the actual viewing somewhat disappointing as a result. I hoped the same wouldn’t be said of Cluedo.
     
    The rules of Cluedo are complex in their complexity. There are cards for each of the rooms , each of the weapons and each of the characters. One of each is put in an envelope and the rest are handed out to the players. For all you know, you could be the killer. I was. #Spoilers.

    The aim of the game is to work out what happened and where and by whom. When there are six of you, it can get a bit involved because everyone has some kind of sick strategy. It feels like it goes on for ages before you get to do anything and your poor little part is being dragged all over the shop. In that way it’s very much like an inefficient handjob.

    I watched the finesse with which my friends played and probably learnt more about the situation from their reaction than I did from actually taking any turns. It’s basically a game of elimination. Then you head into your mind palace and try to fathom out how exactly you would kill someone with a candlestick. I suppose the obvious choice is blunt force trauma it could also be fun to down the throat or up the anus of your intended victim until they choked.

    It took three of us making a dive for the centre to make our allegations before we were able to conclude that I was in fact the murderer. If I had known from the off then I would have done whatever I could to put the other players off, or I would have booked a flight to the Philippines. Either way, they never would have caught me.

  • #11 – Ride a horse.

    #11 – Ride a horse.

    They say that horses are intelligent creatures, don’t they?
    Wait, am I thinking of dolphins? Or velociraptors?
    Clever girl.

    img_1581
    Anyway, one of the things I really wanted to do was ride a horse. I think I was inspired by Django Unchained. I can’t think what other reason I have for wanting to do anything. Ride a horse. Become a free man. Eat some white cake.
    The opportunity to ride a horse came to be on my actual 30th birthday. Clarissa had offered before but I had never committed. Here’s the thing about saying you’re going to do something, sometimes you actually end up doing it.

    I don’t trust horses. I feel like they are plotting something. What do they know that we don’t? Why are they always standing about, watching everything? What have they seen? They say “oh, if I could be a fly on the wall”, try being a fucking horse.

    The first thing I noticed about Bentley, my noble stead, is that he was massive. Apparently he’s small for a horse. He’s bigger than a vacuum cleaner or a Paul Schiernecker so in the grand scheme of things, I’m declaring him big. He also didn’t like me. Horses do what the fuck they want, don’t they? Unless you’re some kind of cryptic horse whisperer, threatening that they’ll become Iceland Lasagne, horses rule the roost. Clarissa made me dress him in a little S&M waistcoat and then we took him out into the ménage. That’s basically where they train horses and idiots, dressed in pea coats, who haven’t been on horses before. It’s a fenced in square, covered over in sand, so if you land on your tuchus you’re not going to die.

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    I assumed I would be a naturally gifted horse rider. I quickly realised that the reason I thought I would be able to ride is that I once spent an entire weekend eating chicken nuggets and playing Red Dead Redemption. It turns out that you can’t tap A to make it go faster. Instead, you have to be horrible to him.

    Basically, there are a lot of instructions to follow. I was busy trying to send pictures to my brothers and didn’t hear a lot of them. It’s sort of like riding a bike. You put your hand out to the side to make a turn. You also have to talk to the horse. This is where it becomes different to riding a bike. You don’t talk to a bike. I’ve seen people talking to bikes but they were in Amsterdam.
    You are supposed to be sure of what you’re saying, which is difficult when you don’t ever feel sure of what you’re saying. I mean, how can I be in charge, he’s been horse riding a lot more than I have, and we both know it.

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    After much persuasion (Clarissa to me), Bentley started doing what I wanted. He still stopped at the gate because he hated me and he always diverted off the course but other than that, we had a good time. I even managed to get him to trot.
    The only harsh thing is that to do so, you have to give them a little kicking. At first I was really apprehensive because it’s like someone punching me in the kidneys to force me to run.

    Basically, riding horses is excellent. Now I’m gonna go and hunt some foxes and poor people.

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  • #5 – Write a letter to myself at the age of 60.

    Dear Paul,
    As you can imagine, this is a weird letter to have to write. I mean, I’m me. You’re me. It’s asking for all kinds of disappointment for either one, or both of us. I have spent a lot of years worrying about not achieving the great things I always felt I would achieve. I don’t want to put too much of a downer on what I am hoping is a spectacular birthday for us both.

    I am writing this letter as part of a challenge I set myself. I wanted to complete a list of thirty things I wanted to do before I was thirty. I achieved some of these. I am hoping that between the pair of us we managed to take that train ride across India and visit somewhere to see the Northern Lights.

    So here is where I am at now. I’m thirty years old. I am working. I know I am lucky to have a job but it is not what I feel I was put on this planet to do.
    I have a one-bedroom flat where I can see the hospital in which I was born from the kitchen window. This flat is always cold, especially in February. We are due to clear the mortgage in thirty-two years.

    I have independently published four books (Where Did All The Money Go, The Stamp Collective, Yallah! and The Stamp Brotherhood). I have written, recorded and released an album called Workbook. My latest project was co-writing a zombie dinner show called Delectably Dead with Scott. All I want to do is write and love and travel.

    Today I went for lunch with Clarissa and then rode Bentley, her horse. Again, this is something that was on my list of things to do before I was thirty.
    I’m waiting for Luke, Luke, Ben, Kate and Alex to come round for pizza and games. I’m taking Clarissa, Dad and Sue to see Delectably Dead tomorrow.
    On Friday I’ll be out in Southend with my friends. I wonder what you are doing and who you are with. I hope you see Robb and Edd as much as you can. Unfortunately, they know you better than anyone and should be feared and respected.

    I hope you don’t let your ego step on important friendships and I hope you are still a force to be reckoned with.

    I guess what I was to say is that I am proud of the pair of us. Wherever you are, it’s where I am heading and I know you have solid reasons for everything.
    Just stay true to who you are and what we want.

    If you aren’t still writing then now is the time to pick it up again. Go and listen to DeBussy and make something great.

    I love you.

    Paul.
    x.

  • Electrocute.

  • Davey Hal – Materials Logic

    It would be fair to say that our little seaside town is not short of talent. That’s why I was pleased to see that one of the most prominent voices on the local scene, Davey Hal, was working on his first solo album, and enthralled when he asked me to give Materials Logic an exclusive listen.

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    From the piano run on Soothe The Grey, the opener, you are invited into Hal’s world, a heady mix of late night love stories in a cocktail lounge. The harmonies present are ethereal, almost medieval in tone, grand. It’s strong without ever being overstated. The piano accompanies and underpins lyrics on royalty and death. This is immediately followed by Night Walking, a song with so much jazz club funk to its bassline that it forces a waltz quickstep into your feet as you attempt to move to the beat. It’s here that Hal’s voice is given the chance to sour, on a chorus that has been stuck in my head for at least the last fortnight.  The song that was played on TIME107.5FM last week, finally bridging the gap between those who love Materials Logic and those who are yet to hear it. It has a In The Wee Small Hours.

    White Walls sounds closer to the Davey Hal you might have seen at one of the many performances he blesses upon our town. A simple guitar track, with a strange likeness to something High Flying Birds would produce. It’s a song of attempted escape, an ode to love. The album takes a moment to recover with the instrumental track, Berdou, before Davey can pick up his guitar again and ask you to Run With Me. It’s the first real pop song of the album. It sounds like an instant classic, something beautiful and familiar. There’s a Paul Simon influence in there at times and yet another chorus worthy of being sung back by thousands of voices. Album title track Materials Logic slows matters down considerably, like a villain’s exposition in a performance, Hal’s voice starting out in a low chatter that sounds like it’s creeping before he soars, showcasing his range, crying out for an answer. The key change into the final refrain is particularly chilling.

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    “Head up, left foot against a wall” he begins on Fingertips before listing attributes of a lover in a seaside town. It’s equal parts affectionate and scathing, figuring that the subject is human anyway and does her hair while he’s asleep. Your Stone is close in tone to the title track, again going through the trials of some mystery woman Hal is observing and inspired by. Up Into Her Clouds is a straight-up love song, drawing on weather in the way only an Englishman can in order to explain his amore for anyone. The jaunty piano solo in the middle is reminiscent of something on Rubber Soul before Hal reveals that his admiration proved too much and turns the mood sour in the way love often does.

    Dear Mary creeps in like another performance piece, sung in the early hours and utilising everything Hal has to explain the situation to his Mary to the point of his own frustration. My Senses ambles in after her, the final thoughts of a man who has given everything of his own over eleven tracks and 42 minutes. It is close to Turner’s Submarine EP in production, nothing to overcomplicate and draw from the raw talent that is Davey Hal and the showcase of this that is Materials Logic.

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    Materials Logic by Davey Hal is available on iTunes now.